Cubans - Kinship, Marriage, and Family

Kinship.
Prerevolutionary kinship ties and social ties of the Cuban upper class
were based in part on patrilineal descent from the Spanish colonial
aristocracy. The ability to trace family backgrounds sharing common
names and patron saints became somewhat less significant in the decades
following establishment of the republic and declined even more
significantly after the 1959 Revolution and the exodus of large numbers
of the upper class. Lower-class Cubans demonstrated much less regard for
lineage than had the middle class but continued the Latin tradition of
godparenting and maintaining close relationships with and responsibility
for the extended family.

Marriage.
In the prerevolutionary period, within the framework of a
Catholic-Latin society and rural/urban economic polarization,
church-sanctioned marriage and baptisms assumed more importance in the
cities than in the countryside. A relatively low marriage rate, cited as
less than 5 per 1,000 in the late colonial period, reflected emphasis on
common-law marriages in the countryside. Since the 1959 Revolution,
rates of both marriage and divorce have tended to increase and become
more similar for rural and urban areas. The marriage rate declined
somewhat in the late 1970s, however, as the housing shortage limited the
establishment of separate households. Postmarital residence tends to be
patrilocal and has at times required doubling up of families. In 1979
extended families resided in 40 percent of Cuban households. Various
types of birth control, including abortion, are available.

Domestic Unit.
Efforts to strengthen family solidarity, stability, and female equality
include the enactment of the 1975 Family Code, which identifies the
nuclear family as the essential social unit responsible for improving
the health and welfare of society. The code calls for equal sharing of
responsibilities in household work, maintenance, and child rearing, as
well as equal commitment to respect and loyalty in marriage. Legally
mandated child-care centers and maternity leaves are among the projects
and policies intended to reduce gender inequality and modify traditional
gender-defined roles.

Inheritance.
The Rent Reform and Agrarian Reform Laws of 1959 and subsequent
legislation aimed at redistribution of wealth focused on limiting rent
charges, foreign ownership of property, and private landownership, as
well as nationalizing rural property, establishing cooperatives, and
transferring land to sharecroppers and tenants. Legislation enacted with
the objective of progressing toward abolition of private property has
restricted the sale, mortgaging, and inheritance of land and has
successfully increased state purchases of land. Other personal property
assets may be inherited with some restrictions.

Socialization.
In addition to social conformity reinforced by traditional family
relationships, Cubans find both overt and subtle pressures to conform to
the values of revolutionary socialist ideology.